I'm a Senior Fellow at the Cato Institute and have written for a wide
range of newspapers, magazines and websites. My books include "FDR's Folly," "Bully Boy," "Wilson's War," "Greatest Emancipations," "Risk, Ruin & Riches," "Gnomes of Tokyo" and "The Triumph of Liberty." I graduated from the University of Chicago in economic history. Research has taken me to England, Germany, Switzerland, Argentina, Brazil, Japan, India and China. Milton Friedman wrote that my "analysis is thoroughly documented, relying on an impressive variety of popular and academic literature both contemporary and historical." Thomas Sowell: "a warning of what can happen when leaders are chosen for their charm, charisma and rhetoric." David Landes: "Powell is one tough-minded historian, willing to let the chips fall where they may." Paul Johnson: "Jim Powell is a man of great energy, determination, obstinancy and courage, and all these qualities have gone into his work." John Stossel: "A terrific read."

Barack Obama: The Anti Economic Growth President

According to historian Robert Nisbet, “By the second half of the nineteenth century, the concept of progress had become almost as sacred to Americans of all classes as any formal religious precept…[the idea of progress] was grass-roots evangelism in America from one coast to the other.” This belief in human progress inspired millions of people to head west and settle new territory, build new businesses, serve new markets and create an opportunity society the likes of which the world had never seen.

To be sure, there were naysayers, like the English economist Thomas Malthus who feared that markets wouldn’t be able to produce enough food for growing populations. The French economist Frédéric Bastiat pointed out that “Here [in Paris] are a million human beings who would all die in a few days if supplies did not flow in… And yet all are sleeping peacefully without being disturbed…We put our faith in self interest and voluntary exchange.” The quickest way to end a famine, as the British free traders Richard Cobden and John Bright demonstrated dramatically after the 1845 failure of the Irish potato crop, is to abolish tariffs and other trade restrictions that make it difficult or impossible for people to buy food wherever supplies are available.

In England during the 19th century Industrial Revolution, aristocrats as well as socialists denounced entrepreneurs who created factory jobs and produced cheap goods for ordinary people. The claim was that living standards for factory workers were becoming worse and worse. But on the farms where most factory workers came from, labor was hard, it was tedious, and everybody was out in the fields from sun‑up to sun-down. Children did plenty of farm work, too. Farm people continued migrating to factory towns, which suggested that despite all the drawbacks of factory work, those people believed it was a better option for them. In fact, for millions the alternative to factory work was starvation.

Competition spurred businesses to improve quality as well as drive down prices. For example, economic historian Joel Mokyr reported that “A typical textile product in 1830 was better in terms of the evenness of its fabric, its durability, its ability to absorb and maintain color, its ease of laundering, and so on. The same is true for a wide range of products, from iron pots to glass to steel pens to printed illustrations in books.” Overall, economic historian David Landes declared, markets produced “an enormous increase in the output and variety of goods and services, and this alone has changed man’s way of life more than anything since the discovery of fire.”

The most telling evidence about progress is life expectancy. For instance, the percentage of London-born children who survived at least to their fifth birthday more than doubled from about 25 percent in 1730-1749 to about 68 percent in 1810-1829. This was an era when there was child labor, and deadly infectious diseases were common. Overall, between 1760 and 1850, life expectancy went up.

Back then, many people didn’t understand how something as important as human progress could occur without government planning or control. But languages, markets, sciences and cultures developed spontaneously, without government planning or control. Many laws codified what had been customary practices that developed over a long period of time.

The British author Herbert Spencer – best-known for his writings about evolution (he coined the term “survival of the fittest”) — elaborated on the idea that human progress was a spontaneous phenomenon that arose within a framework of a rule of law and economic freedom including secure private property rights, freedom of contract, freedom of movement and freedom of trade. In Principles of Sociology, Spencer wrote that “The turning of wilderness into farm land, cleared, fenced and drained, has been achieved not by legislative direction but by men working for individual profit…villages, towns, cities, have grown up under the desires of men to satisfy their wants …the voluntary cooperation of citizens formed canals, railways, telegraphs, and other means of communication and distribution…science has resulted from individuals prompted not by the ruling agency but by their own inclinations…And supplementing these come the innumerable companies, associations, unions, societies, clubs, philanthropy, culture, art, amusement, all of them arising from the unforced cooperation of citizens without governmental help — sometimes in spite of governmental hindrances.”

Human progress began eons before there were modern welfare states, and it has continued up to the present wherever governments weren’t disrupting markets with taxation, regulation, expropriation or war. Economist Julian Simon noted that “In the nineteenth century, the planet Earth could sustain only one billion people. Ten thousand years ago, only 4 million could keep themselves alive. Now, more than 5 billion people are living longer and more healthily than ever before, on average.”

By contrast, it is during crises when economies stop growing or decline that multitudes become anxious, resentful and envious. Economic crises often spawn extremist political movements. In the United States during the Great Depression, Louisiana senator Huey Long developed a national following for his “Share the Wealth” class warfare campaign. During the 1940s, the Argentine demagogue Juan Péron gained power by appealing to the “descamisados” (“shirtless ones”). Adolf Hitler emerged as a political figure to reckon with during Germany’s runaway inflation of 1923, when he appealed to “starving billionaires” who had bundles of paper money worth less than a loaf of bread. Both Lenin in Russia and Mao in China seized power amidst economic as well as political chaos.

So, the stakes are high. If the anti-growth view prevails, we might find ourselves slipping into a new dark age. But if voters choose political leaders committed to economic growth, there could be a new boom ahead.

Jim Powell, a Senior Fellow at the Cato Institute, is the author of FDR’s Folly, Bully Boy, Wilson’s War, Greatest Emancipations, Gnomes of Tokyo, The Triumph of Liberty and other books.

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